I looked at some girl’s myspace page and it made comments about “Emo” and I tried to search about it, but it showed me pictures of high school boys with soup bowl haircuts looking sad.
What exactly is “Emo” – I was able to figure it meant emotional, but it means more than that – is it some kind of new hippie thing or something?
That’s basically it.
Simplest way to answer is to note the adolescent tendency to adopt an “identity” – to conform, to some degree, to a group stereotype appealing to the teen. Examples from the past might include jocks, black-leather-jacket-wearing biker-wannabees, pseudo-hippies, stoners, preppies, etc.
Now consider the “Goth” image – dressed in black (occasionally with a white accent), pale complexion, trenchcoat, fascination with Vampires and faux-Satanism…
Emo is a spinoff from that, retaining the black-and-white “dress code” (IIRC sometimes with a single red accent), adding a freedom to give vent to the traditional adolescent mood swings and angst, with a particular emphasis on the depressive element. This latter is the basis for the “Emo” (for Emotional) tag.
It’s essentially a group of Goth that went metrosexual.
Try this emo instead.
Much more humorous.
Going off what Polycarp stated, it’s a subgenre of the punksters. Punk-lite. Not quite scene, which is colorful, but not dark enough to be goth. Usually emos are teenaged males who are quite metro (heh, Sage Rat) and feel the world just doesn’t understand. The are not anarchy “hate the world”, but rather “the world hates me, woe is me”. They usually are tied to scenester girls and hang with the skaters.
TheKid is scene, heaven help me, and many of the emo boys from last year have found the magic plant and have become stoners. They’ve ditched the guyliner and now wear those doofy baja pullovers.
The Classic Emo.
Here’s an interesting article on emo. Not sure how factual it is though:
This opens up a new question.
What are “Scenesters”? Never heard of that one.
I’d say it’s highly fanciful. The very first sentence speaks of emo coming fro Latin buy, purchase. There is indeed such a Latin term but it has nothing at all to do with the youth subculture. (Why on earth would it?)
Wikipedia itself suggests the far more likely origin:
Emo has always been around. It’s just emotional adolescents. What’s new about that?
What’s new about it is that this is the first time it’s been marketed. Personally, I’m surprised it hasn’t happened earlier.
When I first started seeing and reading about the term I thought for sure it had to have something to do with Emo Philips the comedian (because of the hair). But as I read more about them I thought, “Emo Philips isn’t like this”. Turns out the hair connection was just a coincidence.
Psst. A couple of clues: it’s a website call “uncyclopedia”. The top of the page says: “PIECE OF CRAP WARNING! - This page is a piece of crap. The author(s) acknowledge this.”
Whoosh!
:smack: :smack: :smack:
Heard this one from youngest daughter yesterday - same one who educated me to emo a couple of years back. Does thqt qualify me as hip? 
As I understand it, “scene” kids dress the role of either emo or prep, but do not otherwise adopt the “lifestyle/attitude.”
Paradigmatic Emo.
-FrL-
To be clear, I believe it’s supposed to be an epithet, accusing the “scene kid” in question of being somehow insincere.
-FrL-
I knew somebopdy would come up with this.
I can’t open it at work – it’s gross or suggestive or both. But the description fits:
Tickle Me Emo
www.compfused. com/directlink/4329
I’ve broken the link in the interests of NSFW stuff
The thing about Emo kids is that they hate being called Emo, I should know, since I teach quite a lot of them.
It’s basically an updated beatnik: young pale male, dark 2nd hand suit jacket, black denims, white shirt, thin tie and Converse hi tops. Has a canvas messenger bag, goes to poetry slams, think that they invented irony and sincerely believes that no one understands him. The bottle black hair and bangs are a must, as is having posted a lot to facebook. Photography is a passion - " *I see the world the way it * really is thru the lens."
The female Emo has a choice of black or totally white hair, (not bleached or blonde, white) sometimes with part of it fire engine red, or even all of it red. A heavy layer of make up, sometimes white pancake, very heavy eye liner and - to be ironic - some Barbie type paraphernalia. The clothes could be described as trashy (as in second hand) and slutty, and most garments will be black.
Both genders are into piercing and tatoos.
